BY: Mustapha Lawal
Gender-based harassment, shaming, or threats often begin with manufactured stories: lies, whispered rumours, surfacing screenshots, voice notes, or manipulated photos used to target and weaponise gender.
This is the hidden machinery behind many of the attacks that women across the world and Africa face today, a machinery that turns misinformation into gender-based violence. The campaigns are rarely organised in neat digital rooms or behind obvious political agendas. Instead, they move through overlapping networks of strangers, acquaintances, opportunists, bots, fans, critics and anonymous actors who often don’t recognise the violence they are helping to build. By the time the misinformation reaches its peak, the damage is already done.
To understand this phenomenon, it helps to trace the anatomy of a GBV misinformation campaign, how it starts, who sustains it and why it carries such destructive power.
The Moment a Target Is Chosen
Every campaign begins with a choice, whether conscious or circumstantial. Sometimes a woman becomes a target simply because she has visibility. A young student posts a photo that goes viral by accident. A female journalist breaks a story that challenges political interests. A creator becomes popular enough to attract envy. A woman speaks up about injustice, or positions herself for public office, or refuses to conform to what others believe her gender should allow.
Her visibility becomes the invitation. Her gender becomes the excuse.
In many East African and West African cases, the pattern is clear: the moment a woman steps into public life, her digital identity becomes vulnerable. She is no longer judged by her work alone, but by her perceived morality, imagined relationships, or fabricated behaviour. A single manipulated image or false claim becomes the spark — and the violence begins to organise itself around that spark.
The First Lie Is Manufactured
The origin point of a GBV misinformation campaign is rarely complex. It can be a photoshopped image created by someone with basic editing skills. It can be a private photo stolen and taken out of context. It can be a short video, cropped to distort the meaning. It can be an old image paired with a new rumour. It can even be an AI-generated deepfake.
In Kenya, researchers documenting online abuse of women creators found that many attacks began when a false narrative was seeded through a screenshot or quote that never existed. In Tanzania, deepfake videos circulated during the 2024 local government election cycle showed how synthetic media could be used to humiliate women candidates. In South Africa, impersonation accounts cloned women’s identities within minutes, creating fake profiles that seeded harmful rumours with astonishing speed.
The goal at this early stage is simple: create content that looks real enough to provoke an emotional reaction. The first lie doesn’t need to be perfect. It only needs to be plausible. Once people begin asking, “Did she really do that?” the campaign has already achieved its opening victory.
The Crowd Takes Over
What happens next is usually rapid and ruthless.
The misinformation no longer requires its creator. The crowd takes over.
A doctored image leaves the private chat where it originated and enters community WhatsApp groups, Facebook pages, TikTok stitches, forwarded Telegram channels and Twitter quote tweets. Strangers who have never met the woman begin explaining her motives, constructing detailed false narratives and “adding context” that only deepens the lie. Influencers and microbloggers seeking engagement use the rumour to generate commentary. Meme pages make jokes. Anonymous accounts turn it into entertainment.
This is where gender becomes a multiplier. A false rumour about a man often evokes scepticism. A false rumour about a woman — especially one with sexual undertones — is treated as inherently more believable and socially acceptable to share. It satisfies old stereotypes, confirms long-held biases and makes the violence feel justified to those who amplify it.
By now, the misinformation has taken on a life of its own. It spreads because it reinforces preconceptions about women’s morality, sexuality or ambition. It spreads because digital platforms reward engagement over truth. It spreads because outrage moves faster than verification.
When Digital Harm Crosses Offline Boundaries
As the narrative grows louder, the real woman at the centre of the storm begins to feel the consequences. People she knows encounter the rumour before she does. Family and colleagues start asking questions. Her professional reputation becomes shaky. Sometimes, police or school authorities get involved, acting on misinformation rather than fact.
In Kenya’s recent study on technology-facilitated GBV, many female students said the shame of a rumour was often more devastating than the content itself. The fear of being judged made them withdraw from classes, avoid social spaces or isolate themselves from peers. In Nigeria, women journalists described feeling unsafe in public because the threats following an online smear campaign quickly escalated into physical intimidation. In South Africa, women whose images had been manipulated spoke of long-term anxiety, constant fear of re-exposure and the emotional exhaustion of being forced to explain lies they did not create.
At this stage, the violence becomes multidimensional. It is digital and emotional, social and psychological, sometimes physical. The misinformation has morphed into a weapon — and the target feels its full weight.
The Silence That Campaigns Depend On
What makes GBV misinformation campaigns particularly harmful is not just the lie but the silence that follows it. Many women never respond publicly. Some fear that defending themselves will draw more attention to the false story. Others worry that their institutions, families or communities will not believe them. Some simply lack the digital literacy or resources to challenge a rumour that has already gone viral. Silence becomes misinterpreted as guilt. Rumour becomes “evidence.” The campaign’s damage becomes fixed.
This silence, much like the misinformation itself, grows into a form of violence. It forces women out of online spaces, deters them from reporting the abuse, and convinces them that seeking justice will only deepen the harm.
The Late Arrival of the Fact Check
By the time fact-checkers begin investigating, the story has often travelled too far. Factcheckers can debunk a manipulated image or prove that a viral allegation is false, but the timeline matters. A correction rarely moves as fast as an accusation. A debunk may restore truth, but it does not easily erase memory.
Yet the role of fact-checkers remains crucial. Each debunk chips away at the culture that normalises the weaponisation of misinformation. Each exposé reveals the mechanics of manipulation and the actors behind it. Each verified truth gives survivors something tangible to reclaim their dignity.
Still, the late arrival of truth highlights a pressing reality: misinformation is no longer a side issue in the conversation about GBV. It is part of the violence itself.
Understanding the Machinery Is Step One
If Africa is to confront the rising wave of technology-facilitated GBV, it must begin by understanding how GBV misinformation campaigns function. They thrive on gender bias, digital gaps, social sensationalism and the speed of online platforms. They draw their power from shame, silence and unequal cultural norms. And they rely on a public that shares first and asks questions later.
The challenge of the 2025 16 Days of Activism is not merely to condemn GBV but to dismantle the lies that fuel it. Recognising the anatomy of misinformation campaigns is the first step. Interrupting their spread is the next step. Ensuring that survivors are believed, protected and equipped with the truth is the real work ahead.
Because every GBV misinformation campaign begins with a lie, but it does not have to end in silence.
